What happened to the free PlayStation Plus version of Driveclub that was supposed to be available to subscribers this week? According to game director Paul Rustchynsky it’s being held back until the retail game’s connectivity issues are ironed out.
Players are having trouble connecting to Driveclub‘s servers, and while the game can be played offline (thank goodness), the entire concept is deeply rooted in multiplayer racing, which does not work if the players can’t reach the server. Prior to the game going on sale yesterday I connected to the servers fairly regularly. Since yesterday it’s been more miss than hit.
In a Facebook post earlier today, Rustchynsky apologized for the server issues, assuring players they were being addressed over the coming days.
We are sorry if you are having a hard time getting online as we know many of you are. Please be aware that the game will automatically keep trying to connect you. Once you’re online, you should have no further problems during your session.
Everyone at the studio is now working hard to get new updates ready for the game servers to improve connectivity. We will be rolling out these updates day by day and will keep you informed.
He goes on to says that in order to ” help all Driveclub players who have the game already” they are holding back to PS Plus Edition and the My Driveclub app indefinitely.
It’s a good call. The PS Plus Edition may be a light version of the game, but it still gives players access to online, and the last thing a game struggling with server issues needs another couple hundred thousand more users trying to connect.
Comments
24 responses to “Free Driveclub Delayed Until Paying Customers Can Connect”
Boooooo! Been waiting for this for ages! Can’t complain though I suppose as we’ll get the PS+ version eventually.
My only concern is they don’t classify PS+ members as “paying”. Pretty sure I pay for that service, and there may be people who paid for it just to get DriveClub, sure they paid less but that doesn’t make them any less of a paying customer.
Well in their defence, do you really want a totally broken game, when you could wait a week and not hate it? Free players are far more likely to try playing it a day or two, blast it as being crap, and uninstall. They haven’t spent anything except bandwidth.
Mind you, after being delayed a damn year I’d expect PS+ customers to get it a week or two early for loyalty.
I was really excited about getting this today…guess I’ll have to wait. Oh well, Minecraft will keep me going for a while.
What happened to PlayStation being the racing console? Been an absolute wasteland on the PS4 since launch. Gran Turismo’s are constantly delayed, driveclub has been delayed over a year, they need to sort this out going forward.
IMO Playstation hasn’t been the benchmark console for racers since the PS2.
The GT series is (while still technically good) a joke of delays, terribly timed releases and poorly managed assets. They released ONE much delayed GT game in the entire lifecycle of the PS3 and one game after the PS4 already launched. A NEW GT game won’t hit the PS4 for at least a couple of years and even then you can bet it’ll still be reusing assets from the PS3/2.
From the reviews I’ve seen Driveclub is pretty underwhelming too.
Meanwhile the Forza Motorsport series has gone from strength to strength (ok, maybe the last one was a bit of a step sideways) and with new releases every 2 years or so and the last game setting a wonderful platform for the next Forza game to be epic. The only difference is that Turn 10 can make new cars/ tracks ect at a rate fast enough to allow them to ditch EVERYTHING like they did during the leap to the Xbone and just start again. Polyphony is just a terribly managed studio that never gets anything done on time and who are so determined the release MASSIVE games that their projects are always late and full of half-baked content.
The Horizon series continues to be a very well received racer aimed at the more casual market and has taken over the throne that Project Gotham Racing held as “best console exclusive casual racer”.
Almost all other racers (NFS, Burnout, Dirt ect) are all multi-platform,
Yep. I’ve never heard of PlayStation being THE Racing Console, and I’m not (primarily) an Xbox guy, but I’d have to say Forza has become the new front runner for racing on consoles.
I jumped from PS to xbox with the 360 when GT4 was delayed for PS3…. for about a year or so. Forza was not as good for a while but now I think they are at least comparable, and horizon using the forza engine makes it better. I have never been sad about jumping across to xbox, and the ongoing issues PS seems to have with connectivity seem to never go away. I have been really happy with xbox live, and I reckon the years of headstart MS have with the paid system are going to serve them well (Especially now they have a guy running xbox who vaguely seems to understand what people want…..)
It was the racing console when GT was THE racing game though.
The first couple of games were so far ahead of the rest of the pack it’s not funny.
IMO GT was the best reason to own a PS2 up until the release for Forza Motorsport…. And funnily enough I’m not even much of a racing game fan.
Was considering getting the free version, but after reading the reviews doubt I’ll bother.
The thing about reviews are half the time they are wrong, I’d give it a go not unless you have a pretty small data cap. I normally forgo reviews and forge my own opinions and only then I’ll refer a mate to said game
Yea I am normally the same, but some of these are woefully low, 6/10 I have unlimited data so I still might, have you played it?
I haven’t yet, I’m in the same boat……waiting. if they can sort out their connection issues this may be good fun with friends. Different game but if you remember war in the north that was pretty poorly received mind you it didn’t receive the attention of bigger games. I played it with a friend and it was pretty darn good ‘a diamond in the rough’
I loved that game! it was definately better with a mate though. I’m not the biggest racing fan anyway, Forza 5 was ok, bit too sim for me, played Horizon 2 in the weekend and really enjoyed it though and loved the Dirt series.
Dirt haha yes!!! Excellent games, surely there would be one in the pipeline ☺
I’m still hoping for a new DIRT game, I pumped a lot of time in DIRT 3, it was great!
Quite shocked that they still werent prepared for launch even after so many delays. I’m sure the game looks stunning but it will need more then that to hold the playerbase.
On the otherhand I know how much stress these poor game developers must be going through seeing their product finally launch was always going to be a big task on new gen as a new IP.
Remember when this was suppose to be a launch game? A whole year delay and the consensus is that it’s okay. Definitely not “PS4’s Forza killer”
It’s funny because on one hand they avoided having a half-baked game get smashed in comparison to the (also somewhat half-baked) Forza 5.
On the other hand Driveclub is a casual racer and it’s now been released at the same time as an even more similar game in the casual focused Forza Horizon, which is by all accounts that I’ve seen is the far better game.
Not really when you’re paying for Playstation plus.
As a late comer to PSN plus (after getting a PS4) I only pay for the service for online functionality. I see all the IGC games as a bonus to that service. If they want to delay Driveclub to make sure they release a ‘better’ product, so be it. Even if it turns out to be shit, its not like I bought Plus for game. Its a dick move though that they did say it was a PS4 day one release only to delay it. Iirc wasnt Watchdogs meant to bea day one release too? We all know how delays on delays made that game turn out
If you are getting PS+ just for the multiplayer and the games as a bonus – are you not concerned at all about Sony’s constant PSN issues in terms of reliability/stability and uptime? Personally after coming from LIVE to PS+ i am now committed to after my year running out only paying for PS+ month to month and will continually let my sub drop when i know i will not be playing multiplayer next month (with the lack of PS4 titles this year and in the future that won’t be hard to do).
I just find it incredibly concerning that there dosen’t seem to be any increase in stability or reliability of the PSN service when Sony is now raking in the the dough and do not seem on the surface to be investing any of the money they are making from PS+ into better online architecture/servers.
Not as concerned as I thought i would be. Even with all the hacks and downtimes ive only really had problems with Destiny. I get more pissed off at my Optus-cant-change-my-dns-so-no-Netflix-for-joo router than i am with service downtime.
Enter the DNS straight into the PS3/PS4, works a treat for me (I’m with Telstra but have one of their routers so can’t change the DNS on the router itself)
I didn’t even know Driveclub had come out..I feel like Horizon 2 has already won lol